The Big Joke:
Written in 1955, the story depicts a typical fifties household with a stay-at-home mother, working father, two school-age kids and a baby, except they are goldfish:
Mr. and Mrs. Fish, Walter, Arabella, and last of all, Baby Clarissa. Baby Clarissa wears a white gown and little hat, drinks from a bottle and sits in a high chair. Mama knits ear muffs for Papa. Papa gardens fresh-water ferns. Walter and Arabella play hide and seek in the tall grass on their way to school.
Believable impossibility
Hands down, The Big Joke was my favorite picture book. It was totally impossible (how did fish cook on a stove, take a bubble bath, and hang clothes out to dry on a fish line?!) and totally adorable. If there had been a plastic Fish Family with accessories, I would have begged my mother to buy them for me.
In the story, Walter and Arabella are given stern warning about the “People Upstairs” who “lived above the water, and paddled around in boats and swam with funny little tires around their middles.” The fish students are told to stay away from the hooks and lines.
The little boy from “Upstairs” loses his boot when he tips the boat. For the fish family, it resulted in a “dreadful, dreadful time.”
Being a good citizen of the sea, though, Walter hooks the boy’s boot onto his fishing line. The little boy thinks he’s caught a really big fish, maybe even a whale, until he manages to pull it up only to discover it is his own boot.
The joy of storybooks
For me, the delight in this picture book is how it stirs young imaginations. I had the pleasure of reading The Big Joke to my own children, and then to my grandchildren.
Do you remember your favorite book from childhood?
The Big Joke, story by George Bonsall and pictures by Crosby Newell, ©1955 Wonder Books, New York, is out of print but can be purchased from Abe Books
Linda is a writer, poet, and artist.
Learn more about her award winning novel, In the Context of Love.
Learn more about her picture book, Gordy and the Ghost Crab.
